Chapter Twenty-Nine
Mimic
We made our way back to church and waited for Jack and Indie. I sat in my seat, refusing to talk, refusing to look at anyone. What I just saw; what she just did.
That wasn’t her.
Voices raised around me as my brothers dissected everything they’d just witnessed. The door opened, and I looked up, expecting Indie. Instead, Cash entered.
“Rose?” I asked.
“She’s resting,” he said, taking his seat beside King. “Magyk told her Syrena was the only one allowed to take jobs at the Trick Pony. Rose never even knew that was an option, other than Val telling her she couldn’t help when it came to that fucking place.”
Cash was good for my sister. He loved her. I’d been worried at first, that he was using her to fill a void, knowing it had only been a few months since Rachel had died. But seeing my sister happy was the only thing that mattered to me.
“What did I miss?”
“Indie is a fucking psycho.” Blade said. I launched from my seat and punched him in the face, knocking him out of his seat. Gunner grabbed me from behind as Blade got to his feet. “What the fuck?”
“You deserved that,” King told him. “Sit your ass down.”
Gunner shoved me into my seat and snarled, “Don’t fucking move!” Then he turned his glare on Blade. “Watch your fucking mouth.”
“I meant it as a compliment,” he whined.
“So it’s all true?” Cash asked.
“It’s all true,” King confirmed.
“So now what?”
“We wait for Jack to come back upstairs with her, he deactivates her, and we see what she remembers.”
That was when the door opened a second time, and Jack walked in, followed by Indie.
“Kate, have a seat.” Jack pointed to the chair next to me, and she sat. Her eyes never left him, and though I knew she was still under hypnosis, it pissed me off the way she hung on his every fucking word.
He sat next to Blade, who was still rubbing his jaw. Fucker deserved that and more.
“Are we ready?”
King nodded, and Jack turned his eyes to Indie. “Hour Reckoning.”
She blinked a few times and looked around the room. Her eyes landed on me and then looked down at the clothing she wore. It was just a pair of sweats and a T-shirt, but it was different from what she had on before.
“I guess it’s true,” she whispered.
“What do you remember?” King asked.
“The last thing I remember is walking into the cell with Sting. Is he dead?” King nodded. “Did I kill him?”
“You did. Would you like to know what happened?” When she nodded, King asked, “You want us to tell you, or do you want to see it?”
I held my tongue, waiting for her to answer. I wanted to scream at my president and tell him she didn’t need to fucking see it. She didn’t remember shit, and as long as she didn’t remember, she wouldn’t feel guilty. I didn’t want her living with that on her conscience.
“I’d like to see it.”
“Are you sure, Indie?” Gunner asked. “We can tell you what happened. You don’t need that shit in your head.”
“I agreed to this knowing there was a chance I would remember what happened. Sting wasn’t innocent. I won’t feel bad about ending his life.”
King tipped his head and said, “Run the tape, Nav.”
“King, no.”
Indie placed a hand on my leg; the tension deflated immediately. She had a way of bringing me peace. Something that had been missing from my life.
“I’m gonna start the video after Jack says the words. I don’t know if hearing them as a recording will have the same effect, but we don’t need to test that just yet.”
I didn’t look up at the screen. I heard the sound of bones breaking and Jack talking, but my eyes never left Indie’s.
I studied her face for the smallest hint that what she was seeing was affecting her in a negative way.
The moment I saw the smallest sign of distress, I was taking her out of this room.
“I didn’t talk? The whole time I never said a word, even when you asked me a question, Jack.”
“No, you didn’t.”
“Why?” she whispered.
“We don’t know. I assume you were instructed not to speak. So putting you under again won’t give us the answers we’re looking for if you won’t speak,” King explained.
“You have something else in mind,” Indie said, her eyes locked with King’s.
“The poem. If the entire poem is read, it undoes the hypnosis. You’ll remember everything. All your training, your classes, everything you’ve done while you were hypnotized.”
“They did this on purpose. Knowing if we were ever brought out, it would destroy us.” There was no emotion in her voice. She was almost robotic, and if I hadn’t heard Jack utter the deactivation phrase myself, I would swear she was still under.
“Maybe. Once the poem is read, if you can withstand the onslaught of memories you’ll be subjected to, you’ll also be useless to them. You won’t be able to be activated anymore.”
“But I will still have my skills?” she asked, and my mouth hung open. She was insane. That was the only viable answer.
“You can’t go through that. You have no idea what’s locked inside your head,” I told her.
She glared at me. “This isn’t your choice.”
“At least talk to Haizley first. See what she says,” I pleaded.
“I want to be free, Mimic. If I’m to have any hope of a future, I have to know.”
Gunner stood from his seat and left the room. Indie slammed her elbows onto the table and held her head in her hands. It didn’t take long for him to return with Haizley. She sat beside Indie and placed her arm around her shoulders.
“I have to do this, Haizley. I have to know the truth. It’s the only way to help the others.”
“I know. Let me help you through this.”
Haizley looked up at King. “I want everyone out except Jack.”
“Why?” King asked.
“Because this is going to be traumatic and emotional, and you all don’t need to be here. When she’s ready, she can tell you what you need to know. But for now, get the fuck out.”
My jaw dropped open when King nodded and stood, ushering the others out the door.
“You too, Mimic.”
“No, he can stay.” Indie looked into my eyes. I’d never seen her truly afraid, not since the night of the break-in. When she woke from her trance, after I pushed her away from between my legs.
“I’ve got you.” I held onto her hand as she looked up at Jack.
“I’m ready.” She nodded, and Jack picked up the paper with the poem written on it.
As he said the words, Indie squeezed my hand. Haizley whispered in her ear things I couldn’t hear. But knowing Haizley, they were words of affirmation.
I imagined they were words similar to what my mother used to say to Rose and I when we got hurt, or when we were angry we didn’t have friends to play with. Well, I was angry. Not having friends didn’t seem to bother Rose as much as it did me.
When Jack uttered the final words, Indie broke out in a sob. Her body crumbled forward, and I had never felt more helpless in my entire fucking life.
Jack quietly left the room, his job done. He squeezed my shoulder as he walked by, letting me know my brothers had my back. The brothers I had lied to. The brothers I was still fucking lying to.
I didn’t know what to do, so I rubbed Indie’s back as Haizley held her while she cried. Loud sobs echoed through the room. I didn’t know how long we sat there just holding Indie as her memories came flooding back.
Haizley looked up at me. “She needs rest before she can talk to the others.”
I stood up and gathered Indie in my arms. Her arms went around my neck, and she buried her face in my chest. No one spoke as I walked out of church and down the hallway. I carried her up the stairs to my room. I kicked the door closed and laid her on my bed.
“Don’t leave,” she cried when I pulled away.
“I’m just locking the door.”
I shed my clothes as I returned to the bed and helped Indie remove everything but her panties. I crawled in behind her, planning to spoon, but she turned to face me and sobbed onto my chest.
We lay there for hours, no words spoken between us, but a lifetime of pain and humiliation bound us together. A trauma bond, she called it, when she talked about her sisters. The eleven girls she lived with and escaped with.
I didn’t care what kind of bond it was, as long as she stayed with me forever. She was mine.
Her sobs softened to quiet tears until finally, her breath evened out and she fell asleep. I lay there trapped beneath her, the feel of her fingers splayed over my abs as I drifted off myself, and the nightmares returned.
“I said hold him still, you worthless fuck!”
“I’m trying; the kid is fucking stronger than he looks. Why don’t you switch with me, you old bastard, and see how well you hold him?”
“Don’t do this, please!” I begged them to stop.
Dakota lay on the floor on his back, holding me over him. His arms strapped around my shoulders and his legs wrapped around my waist.
This was a move I could easily get free of.
We’d practiced it endlessly until I had it perfected.
The only difference was that when we were training, my back was to his chest. The way he held me now, we were front to front.
This time, my bare back was exposed to George Stone as he held a scalding hot branding iron in his hand.
“Hold him still!” George screamed.
The cold, dead sound of his voice made me freeze. This was happening whether I wanted it or not. I’d learned early with Dakota to accept my fate. It didn’t mean there wouldn’t be pain, but there wouldn’t be as much.
So, I stopped struggling. I lay in Dakota’s arms and braced for the pain. As soon as the brand hit the center of my back, my shoulders locked up. The scent of burning flesh assaulted my nose, causing bile to rise up my throat.
I tried to swallow it down, but between the pain and the smell, I lost all control. Satisfaction welled inside me as I puked on Dakota’s neck and pissed all over him as the blackness took me under.
I jackknifed up in bed, looking around the room, expecting to see George or Dakota glaring down at me. The sound of Indie’s gasp brought me to the present.
I felt her fingers on my back tracing the lines of my Silver Shadows tattoo. Making her way toward the center.
“What the fuck is this?” she asked, sitting up beside me. “This is not a tattoo.”
“No, it’s a brand.”
“A brand? Like they do to cattle?”
“Yeah.” I swung my legs over the side of the bed. My forearms rested on my legs as I bent over, trying to steady my racing heart. My secret was out.
“Why the fuck were you branded?” She scooted closer, tracing the lines of scarred skin hidden under the large tattoo. She leaned forward and kissed my battered skin. My eyes closed, reveling in the feel of her lips on me.
I looked over my shoulder, my eyes locked on hers, never once dipping to catch a glance of her naked tits on full display.
“Everyone in the Soulless Sinners MC gets branded.”